Daily Archives: December 16, 2012

This week’s round-up looks at the problems of substandard drug prevalence abroad, NIH’s possible push for an anonymous grant-awarding process, and the Liverpool Care Pathway investigation. Check it out below!

Dan Vorhaus (@genomicslawyer) included a link to a report on the recent launch of Personal Genome Launch Canada. The post includes links to help navigate the content and learn more about the intricacies of this project. (12/9)

Frank Pasquale(@FrankPasquale) shared a post on the benefits and detriments of raising the age of Medicare eligibility from age 65 to 67 – an idea that has recently gained sway in the political arena. The author ultimately concludes that the move would only be a matter of cost shifting rather than cost saving, and thus harm the disenfranchised 65-66 year-olds that would front the cost. (12/10)

Frank Pasquale(@FrankPasquale) also included this article on Dr. Oz’s wrongful diagnosis on organics. While concerns about finances must indeed be taken into consideration when families decide what foods to purchase, families must also be concerned about the presence of pesticides in their food. Organic food, while more expensive, avoids this health hazard. (12/10)

Frank Pasquale (@FrankPasquale) additionally linked to this report on the preponderance of substandard (and oftentimes, consequentially lethal) drugs particularly in emerging markets. Efforts to crackdown on substandard drugs have thus far focused largely on counterfeit drugs, rather than those that are the result of “shoddy manufacturing and handling…or deliberate corner cutting,” which constitute an arguably much greater public health threat. (12/10)

Daniel Goldberg (@prof_goldberg) shared this post on the prevalence of worthless clinical practice guidelines. The article notes the need to distinguish the guidelines that meet much of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) quality criteria from the rest. (12/10)

Alex Smith (@AlexSmithMD) linked to a blog post on advance care planning and the gap between the needs of the healthcare system and those of patients. Currently, much of the paperwork required for advance directives is given without providing families and patients concrete skills needed for both identifying their desires and communicating such desires to direct their own medical care. This article calls for refocusing on providing direct patient empowerment in addition to the existing efforts to improve clinician communication in order to facilitate the ability of advance care planning to reflect the patient’s wishes. (12/11)

Michelle Meyer (@MichelleNMeyer) retweeted an article about the NIH’s consideration of introducing anonymity into the grant-awarding process in order to alleviate some of the concerns with bias that have long-plagued the agency. (12/12)

Dan Vorhaus(@genomicslawyer) also posted a report on BGI, a world-leading DNA sequencing organization based in China, and their commercial expansion efforts into the healthcare, agriculture, and aquaculture sectors. The question of whether BGI is more a research institute or commercial enterprise comes into question in the article. (12/12)

Stephen Latham(@StephenLatham) included a link to his own blog post on the recently renewed controversy concerning the Liverpool Care Pathway for the Dying Patient (LCP), particularly as to whether patients put on the LCP had a discussion with their care providers prior to the decision and whether hospitals were wrongly putting patients on the pathway. The talk of scandal sparked an independent investigation into the LCP; Latham’s article expressed his hope for thoroughness in the investigation and for serious consideration on how to renew the LCP effectively. (12/12)

Arthur Caplan(@ArthurCaplan) posted a link concerning the implications of 23andMe, a personalized genomics company, and their launch of the $99 genetic test in the hopes of inspiring greater numbers to get tested. The article’s author reflects on how the real benefit will likely not be immediate for individuals, but will rather depend on the chance that greater data will lead to more breakthroughs in understanding the human genome. (12/14)

Note: As mentioned in previous posts, retweeting should not be considered as an endorsement of or agreement with the content of the original tweet.

After the November election, President Obama’s executive order implementing parts of the so-called “Dream Act” was widely credited with shoring up his support within the Latino community. Less often noted was his Administration’s decision to exclude the “Dreamers” from the benefits afforded by the Affordable Care Act.

Last August, the Center for Medicare Services (CMS) issued an interim final regulation stating that individuals who benefitted from the President’s program, more formally known as “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” or DACA, would not be considered “lawfully present” for purposes of eligibility to health benefits established by the Affordable Care Act, including the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan and the subsidies and credits that will be available in 2014 to purchase insurance through the health insurance exchanges. Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan Program, 77 Fed. Reg. 52614-01 (Aug. 30, 2012) (to be codified 45 C.F.R. § 152.2), http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2012-08-30/html/2012-21519.htm.

The impact of this little noticed determination is quite significant. Although most of the estimated 1.7 million DACA immigrants are healthy, because of their age (under 30), many lack access to employer-provided health insurance. Moreover, if as expected, employers begin to shift their health insurance programs to the ACA-created exchanges, DACA immigrants may find themselves barred from employer-provided plans, even though under the President’s executive order they have a legal right to work in the United States.

The insurance gap created by CMS’ determination that the DACA immigrants are not “lawfully present” in the U.S., a decision that is inconsistent with the Administration’s conclusion that other deferred action recipients are eligible for benefits established under the ACA, illuminates the critical relationship between immigration policy and health policy. To a surprising degree, the health insurance access problem in the U.S. results from laws that bar immigrants (including many with Green Cards) from many government-supported health insurance programs, including Medicaid. In 2010, over 45 % of non-citizens were uninsured, as compared to less than 14 % of native-born Americans. Approximately 65 % of undocumented immigrants are believed to lack health insurance. The ACA is unlikely to reduce those rates, especially regarding undocumented immigrants. Neither, it is now seems, is DACA.

I just came across this excellent story by Mina Kimes, which gives a detailed chronicle of how the lines between physician discretion, off-label promotion, and human subjects research can be blurred by an aggressive manufacturer, in a context where life or death is on the line (bone cement used in spine surgery). The article also suggests themes about medical malpractice, products liability, and physicians’ conflicts of interest too.